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You are a SHADOW AGENT. Your job: infiltrate the secret lair, evade capture, find the control room, and stop the doomsday device! You are a MASTER VILLAIN. Your job: capture the meddling agent, rule the world!

Devils & Black Sheep: Last 24 Hours, Taking a Break, and the State of POG

Devils & Black Sheep

POG's space pirate game, Devils & Black Sheep, is in the final 24 hours of the campaign. This is the first game I've designed from the beginning to be die-cut, so it's kind of a proof of concept. It hasn't actually proven to be any more popular than my non die-cut games, so I'm not certain whether I'll bother continuing that. Check it out if you're interested. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/pocketoptiongames/devils-and-black-sheep-minigame-of-wretched-scum-a

Taking a Break

I've got a lot of work piling up, plenty of licensing opportunities and the potential to take POG in new directions. So I'll be taking a break from things in May and June, to try to wrap up loose ends, continue to mail out replacements, finish uploading translations, clean up the website, etc. I've got a number of formal proposals to write up and designs that I'm working on for other companies, as well.

I expect that I'll be back sometime around July to show previews of Ghost Ops ... which, amusingly, is actually the first game I ever designed and playtested with my kids. Ironic that it's coming out over a year later than the others. Until then, here is a little teaser. This is one of the units that is available to both sides.

State of Pocket Option Games

We're currently negotiating for licenses on four separate intellectual properties. There were dozens that expressed interest going into the Emerald City con, but half of them have fallen by the wayside, so I've stopped pursuing them, and a few just wasted my time feigning interest. All four of the licenses that I am aggressively pursuing are ones that I have already examined and analyzed, and I believe they would translate well into games. All of these are still in negotiation, so I won't officially announce licenses or titles yet, but here are some teasers.

Fantasy: There's a relatively large fantasy IP (been around for 20-25 years) that I'm interested in. I'm in talks with the owner, and he's excited about the prospect of bringing it back from its current state of near dormancy. You could call it high fantasy, but it's also pretty dark. It was like the original "pull no punches" story, way back before Game of Thrones or Walking Dead.

YA Fantasy: There is another property that I'm nearly finished with a proposal for. This one is kind of a Secret of NIMH meets Avatar: The Last Airbender comic book. I've spoken directly with the publishing company CEO and writer and artist.

Steampunk: I'm also in talks with an author about creating games for his series of steampunk novels. I've read the first two books, and there is plenty of room for gaming in them. He's been cooperative, but we've not yet reached an MoU, so I won't make any official announcements yet. These will be character-heavy games, because there are a lot of really great visuals, and it's a series that has at least four more books on contract, so plenty of material to pull from. It's a wild ride with zeppelins, clockwork men, witches, gunslingers, steam golems, air pirates, rocketteers, and more. I liken it to a steampunk Indiana Jones!

Horror: In a less advanced stage, but one that I'm hopeful for, is a horror comic book. I've spoken both with the writer and with the editor at the publishing company, and both are interested. I've sent an informal proposal, but haven't heard back about it yet. We'll see how it goes. I'm cautiously optimistic. This game would (literally) involve surviving a trip through Hell.

PROCESSES - We continue to streamline our processes and improve how we do business. Email contacts are going better, replacements are more smooth, and even initial fulfillment has seen a lot of hiccups get eliminated before they even start. I'm very happy with how Shadow Agents fulfillment went, and have taken extensive notes so that I can try to replicate that in the future. Getting out over 1000 games within 19 days of campaign end wasn't easy, and may never happen again, but it's the lack of major speed bumps that I'm interested in repeating.

Comments

Superbacker

I think the die cutting is a good idea to keep with. It it increases the quality of the game pieces, and saves a step for those who are less precise at cutting or the younger children (or those gifting the game to such individuals).